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Since we last updated...

Their last picture together before saying goodbye - I don't know if they'll remember her as a sister, an aunt, a cousin, or a nanny, but one things for certain, they won't forget Dani!

SINCE WE LAST UPDATED:

* I have fully transitioned into the role of Director of the eMi East Africa office. I’m finding myself much busier these days than I have been since we arrived here a year and a half ago, but overall things are going well.

Chad & I hanging out at their going away party.

* My project team has been working hard these past few weeks and were able to finalize our project report this past week! It turned out great and we’ll be mailing it to the ministry this coming week.* The boys participated in three, week-long camps at the school: soccer camp, basketball camp, and a ‘superstar’ camp that taught them about both sports and character. On the last day of superstar camp, over 600 Ugandan primary school kids came to participate in various games and sports. Samaritan’s Purse put it on and it was a lot of fun.

The boys at Summer camp, taking a break to hear a devotional by Mr. Nick, the camp director.

On the last day of camp, all the kids got to play on a slip and slide!

* Alisha has been working tirelessly in her new classroom to get it ready for the school year. She spent over 40 hours going through stuff, throwing a ton of junk away, organizing and rearranging the room. She also bought a bunch of paint and hired some painters to paint the room. It's looking amazing now!

The finished Kindergarten Room

Alisha had her birthday on Monday. She turned...you'll have to ask her! Neighbor/friend Lynne baked her a birthday cake - her favorite, carrot cake!

* My sister Terri arrived for a 9-day visit. We had a great time and her and Dani enjoyed an amazing safari last weekend. But sadly, we said goodbye early Wednesday morning as they headed out for a week in England/Italy en route back to SoCal.

Terri and Alisha hanging out for coffee at Quality Hill, Alisha's favorite spot in town.

The whole family (minus me, who steered clear of the mess!) joined in for a painting project - painting the blocks for the kindergarten classroom.

The four of us went out to dinner for Alisha's birthday at the new Mexican food place downtown. For Kampala, it's pretty decent Mexican food...but real Mexican food is still something we long for from back home.

One of our last nights with Dani - it's like sending a kid off to college. Fortunately we have a good decade before we have to go through that for real. But our house is a lot different without her around - we're definitely having to readjust.

Terri even braved downtown Kampala on the back of my boda!

* We have been preparing to say goodbye to Dani these past several weeks. We’re sad to be losing our newest family member, but at the same time we’re excited for her to start the next phase of her life – college! We’re so happy and blessed to have had the chance to have her as a part of our family this past year. She’ll always hold a special place in our hearts.

The last supper with Terri and Dani - of course, our favorite, Banana pancakes, were served!

Aunt T was a big fan of the banana pancakes, and the boys were big fans of Aunt T!

Aunt T reading the boys a book on her last night here

The boys each made Dani a going away card and presented it to her on her last night.

* I’m attending a 3-day conference in downtown Kampala this week called the Annual International Standards Conference. This year’s theme is ‘Regional and International Trade – the Role of Standards’. I’m one of only two mzungu’s in attendance – the other is a representative from the French embassy – out of nearly 300 people. Topics include: Eurocodes in Uganda, Safety of Buildings and Construction in Uganda, and Quality of Cement in the Uganda Market. My main reason for attending is to get some professional development hours for my Oregon P.E. license renewal due at the end of the year (30 PDH’s every 2-year renewal period). The Minister of State for Trade was in attendance so it’s a bit of a media circus. The conference is attended by many local business leaders.* Jonah had a broken filling, so we took him in to see the dentist. After x-rays and examination, the dentist said he needed a crown, two other fillings, and possibly a root canal or even extraction with a spacer add afterwards. Yikes! We have to wait 3 weeks to see if the tooth is still sensitive. Pray for him!* Last weekend, we had 4 parties to attend – two 4th of July parties (lots of fun, but made us miss home!) and two goodbye parties. In the next week, we say goodbye to 13 people from the eMi office, not to mention Dani and Terri. It’s not the fun part of our lives here.

We had over 50 people at our house on the 4th of July. It really made us miss America. Early in the day, I went downtown to the second-hand market here ('Owino Market') and found a red Old Navy 2003 flag t-shirt for a dollar! You can find pretty much anything at that market!

Some of the departing eMi Interns and volunteers at the going-away party

Terri and Dani with more interns. This was a great group of interns and they will be sorely missed. There's a big Terri and Dani sized hole in our household too.

* The coming 6-7 weeks will be a fairly quiet time around the office. It will be just Janet and I for part of it, but in August we’ll be joined by intern Jill, who is returning as a long-term volunteer for the Fall. We’re excited as the boys love Jill (Jill was also an intern last winter and arrived in Uganda at the same time as us. She returned for another internship these past couple of months.)* Alisha has a terrible stomach flu at the moment – her first major illness since we’ve been here. Yuk!* Someone attempted to break into the eMi office this past Wednesday night. I received a call at 1:00am from Stephen, our head of security, notifying me that the night guard had found two intruders in the compound and chased them off. They had hopped the wall and switched the power off in the office. So I drove to pickup Stephen and we went to the police station a couple miles away and picked up 3 police officers – two who were carrying rifles. We went and checked out the office and the lot next door where the men had come from, but only found footsteps. They had tried to open the rear, metal kitchen door but fortunately we had it padlocked. By the time I drove the police back to the station and dropped off Stephen, I didn’t get back to bed until 3:30am. I was just glad the night guard had not been harmed. We will be discussing how best to increase our security next week. The police are being very helpful and proactive, and are contacting the neighbors and local chairman (LC) of our area to talk about what to do with this particular lot. Four burglaries have originated from this lot in the last year, which does not have a security wall and can be accessed by anyone off the street. The police also told us that they will be increasing patrols in the area.

Too bad Superman isn't around to help fight crime...or is he?! We bought the movie Superman downtown last weekend and let the boys watch it. The movie wasn't even over yet and Graysen was fashioning this costume together. Dani colored the logo, but the rest was Graysen's creation, including the red Man U towel as his cape! He's since refined the look to include tall, red soccer socks since he noticed Superman has red boots.

UP NEXT:

We’re eagerly anticipating the arrival of Alisha’s parents on July 17th for a month! During their time here they are taking our family to Kenya for a couple week vacation! We are sad to be missing another summer back home, but this trip to Kenya will be a great ‘stand-in’ for our usual camping trip to the redwoods.

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We are the Crawfords - Brad, Alisha, Brodie, Jonah & Graysen. We work with Engineering Ministries International's (EMI's) office in Colorado, having previously lived and worked out of EMI's Uganda (Kampala, Uganda) and UK (Colchester, Essex) offices. This blog is a chronicle of our lives working with EMI.